


the violet and the grey

by imagines



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: (clone and dark shiro are distinct beings in this fic), Alternate Ending, Angst, Dark Shiro - Freeform, Darkfic, Established Relationship, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Not A Happy Ending, clone shiro - Freeform, see end notes for additional warning, the evil twin of The Black Paladins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-29
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-07-01 17:57:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,798
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15779172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imagines/pseuds/imagines
Summary: “We’ve tried everything, Keith. I’m sorry.” In six words, Coran brings Keith’s universe crashing down. They’re out of options. They’re out of time. They’re out of hope.Slumped in his seat on the bridge, Keith can’t look at him. He’d like nothing more than to never forgive him, but none of this is even his fault. None of this is even Shiro’s fault. “So what do we do now?”They have Shiro immobilized in a force-field cell, bound to a chair bolted into the floor, with his remaining arm cuffed behind his back. After all, he’d tried to kill them. (Sheith Angst WeekDay 4: Soul)





	the violet and the grey

**Author's Note:**

> **ADDITIONAL CONTENT WARNING:** The ending of this fic may be upsetting or triggering. However, tagging it would be a massive spoiler. I’ve listed it in the end notes if you wish to check first.

“We’ve tried everything, Keith. I’m sorry.” In six words, Coran brings Keith’s universe crashing down. They’re out of options. They’re out of time. They’re out of hope.

Slumped in his seat on the bridge, Keith can’t look at Coran. He’d like nothing more than to never forgive him, but none of this is even his fault. None of this is even Shiro’s fault. “So what do we do now?”

They have Shiro immobilized in a force-field cell, bound to a chair bolted into the floor, with his remaining arm cuffed behind his back. After all, he’d tried to kill them. Keith had cut off his Galra arm, bringing him down in a haze of pain and confusion.

Pidge and Hunk had run scans on the prosthetic, once they were sure it had been neutralized. Certain idiosyncrasies, blips in the code, had revealed the truth: their leader himself had been infiltrated, transfigured into a spy by Haggar’s hand. The remainder of the bionic limb still fused to Shiro’s body provides Haggar with a pathway into his mind, even if her power over him has been weakened.

They’ve operated on Shiro, leaving him in a healing pod afterward for more cycles than Allura has ever put anyone through before. They’ve medicated him, and imaged his brain, and none of it has done a damn thing to help. The purple light still flickers in Shiro’s eyes: Haggar’s man, trying to show himself. And Shiro, pushing him back.

“We need to—” Allura’s voice breaks.

That’s all it takes for Keith to understand: the fight is over. They have lost. “You’re telling me we have to put him down. As if he’s a rabid dog.” Allura does not deny it. A sour taste rises in the back of Keith’s throat. He forces himself to swallow until it eases. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Pidge’s knees buckle. She sinks onto the floor, making a sound Keith has never heard come out of her before, a strange low moaning. Hunk is still standing, blank-faced and silent, but his cheeks shine wet.

“Who’s gonna do it?” Lance asks, pragmatic at the wrong time.

In lieu of punching Lance in the face, Keith stands suddenly, walks to the door leading off the bridge, and slams his fist into that instead. He does it a second time for good measure. Blood smears on the metal, but his hand’s gone numb. “Me, Lance. Who else?” He steps into the corridor, commanding over his shoulder, “No one follow me. I don’t want you there.”

The thought of any of others being the one to carry this out…he can’t stand it. He wouldn’t be able to look at them, let alone forgive them. To the end of his days, they’d be the person who killed Shiro. And he’d always have questions: was it quick, did it hurt, was Shiro scared? This way, come what may, he’ll know all the answers. This way, he can only ever blame himself.

He doesn’t know which Shiro he hopes to see. If it’s the dark one, it makes his task a fraction easier. But it’s _his_ Shiro to whom he wants to explain himself.

Grey eyes meet Keith’s when he arrives at Shiro’s cell. “Any news?” Shiro asks.

“Yeah,” Keith says. How the hell is he supposed to say it?

Shiro lets out a shaky breath, as if he’s been holding it since he saw Keith approaching. “It’s bad news.”

“Yes.”

“Whatever you need to do, Keith, do it. It’s okay.” Shiro, unfailingly perceptive, seems to have guessed Keith’s intentions.

Keith presses his hands to the force field separating him from Shiro. He wants to hold Shiro one more time, and be held by him. But if Keith were to get that close, it’s almost guaranteed that Shiro would tear out his throat. “Shiro, you don’t understand.”

“You can tell me anything, baby. Even this.”

“I have to—” Keith gags on it; has to turn away and breathe deeply, or he’s going to throw up. When he turns back around, Shiro’s gaze is so soft and full of love that Keith almost flees from his sight. “We can’t let you…live.” There. It’s out. He waits for Shiro’s reaction, whatever it will be.

Shiro’s eyes go wine-dark, the gentle grey eclipsed by ancient magic. “Don’t do this,” he moans in a broken voice. “Give me a chance, baby, I can fix it.”

Keith’s hands begin to shake. “I don’t want to do it!” he bursts out. “But I don’t have a choice!”

“I always knew you’d fail me in the end,” Shiro sighs. “You never could see anything through. You gave up on piloting the Black Lion. You gave up on Voltron. Now here you are, giving up on me.”

Keith’s worst fears, spoken in Shiro’s voice. He will remember forever how it sounded. “I’ll do it fast,” he promises. “You won’t even feel it.”

The violet and the grey battle in Shiro’s eyes. “Keith,” Shiro grits out. “You can’t listen to him. You can’t know—I hear him—he wants to kill all of you, and he wants you to suffer. He won’t stop trying till you’re dead. Please, baby. I know it’s hard. I know. You have to do this for me, okay? I don’t wanna watch you die by my hand.” His breath comes ragged as graveclothes. “I can’t hold him back for long. Hurry, please, before he—”

Blood-red light floods the cell. Shiro’s screaming, his right shoulder blazing. The metal of it melts and reshapes, crawling down his back and chest, until its heat snaps his bonds. Just as suddenly, the light vanishes. Shiro gets to his feet. He’s not even trembling. “See, baby? I can do anything I want.”

“Don’t call me that,” Keith snaps. “You’re not him.”

“No?” Shiro throws his arms wide. “Then what are you waiting for? Get in here and murder me, sweetheart.”

“Fuck you.”

Shiro laughs. It’s horrible. “Is that an offer? We could do it for old times’ sake. I’d make it good for you.”

Keith slams his palms against the force field. Energy ripples outward from the blow. “You’re _disgusting_.” It’s falling apart now. Keith should have done it when Shiro asked him to. Then it would be over, and this sickening conversation wouldn’t be happening.

“Come on, Keith,” Shiro wheedles. “I know you want me. Always so desperate to spread your legs for me—” His face contorts, and he slaps the side of his head so hard he staggers sideways. “Shut _up_!” he screams. “Just shut the fuck up!” Fingers locked in his hair, he falls to his knees on the bare floor. When he looks up, he has found himself again, and his eyes are the color of mist at dawn. A choked-off whimper escapes him. “Keith. You know you have to. It’s getting worse, baby, please. I need you to help me. This is how you help me.”

“I just want to touch you,” Keith sobs. “Before it happens.”

“You can’t. Please, please, don’t wait any longer. It’s not going to get better. You said as many times as it takes,” Shiro pants. “You _promised_ —Keith, _please_ , I don’t know how long—” His jaw clenches. “ _Now_ , Keith! He’s coming!”

Shiro’s order strikes Keith like a bolt of lightning, tripping breakers and throwing his mind into darkness. He must act first and think later, or he’ll never be able to do what Shiro needs. He lowers the force field for a split second and flings himself inside it.

Shiro is crouching in the center of the cell, muscles straining has he holds off a man with twice his strength. “Please, baby, please,” he’s crying. “I love you, it’s all right, just—”

“I love you too, Shiro, so much, forever—” Keith touches the side of Shiro’s throat with his knife, sick and uncertain. “Like this? Should I—”

“ _Do it_!” Shiro screams. “Oh fuck, he’s—”

Then Shiro is gone again, and Keith realizes he’s trapped in the den of a being who understands neither love nor mercy.

It charges. Keith leaps back from it, but it anticipates his movement, it knows all that Shiro knows, it knows exactly how Keith fights. He’s scrambling to control the battle, but this thing has had days to plan its attack. Even down an arm, it’s fast, and relentless, and Keith realizes he might die here.

On one of its lunges, Keith doesn’t dodge quick enough, and it slams into him, throwing him onto his back and pinning his arms with its shins. He barely tucks his chin enough to avoid bashing his head against the floor.

It chokes him, its powerful hand crushing his throat, a hand that until now has only ever touched his body with tenderness. The grief is almost enough to destroy him on its own.

“Die, baby, die,” Shiro sings. “That’s it. Just let go, Keith. You don’t have to fight anymore.”

Everything is fading to grey. Keith’s grip on his knife relaxes, and it falls out of his hand.

Shiro lets go of Keith’s throat and picks up the knife. “Baby, I’m so sorry,” he whispers, and he plunges the blade into the side of his own neck, crumpling instantly.

There’s so much blood. Shiro has seconds to live, and Keith’s voice is gone. But what could he say? He curls close to Shiro, looking into the universe in his grey eyes, into the world that will never be theirs, until it’s over. Only then does he cry, in heaving, rasping sobs forced through his bruised throat.

The team finds him like that, later.

He doesn’t remember being carried to the pod.

He spends the days after it in his room, alternately lying on top of his unmade bed and on the floor. Sometimes they make him eat. No one asks him what happened. No one says Shiro’s name. He thinks they’re afraid of what he’ll do, to them or to himself. The answer is that he’d do nothing. There’s nothing in him anymore. He’s nothing more than a black hole now, swallowing up all the light.

Their luck runs out eventually. The alarm in Keith’s room blares; a Galra scout has spotted them and they’re about to be fired upon. He walks to the bridge, the corridors and lights shimmering and tilting, dreamlike. They stare at him when he arrives, as if he’s a ghost. It’s appropriate: he feels like one.

He assesses the situation. It’s not good. “We’re going to need Voltron,” he says.

“Ideally, yes,” Allura says. “But…”

“Who’s gonna pilot the Black Lion?” Pidge asks.

Keith closes his eyes, drawing the fragments of himself together. _For Shiro_ , he thinks. Everything has always been for Shiro. He takes a deep breath. “I will.”

 

**Author's Note:**

>  **ADDITIONAL CONTENT WARNING:** One of the final scenes contains a suicide with a knife.
> 
> *
> 
> \- If you aren’t sure at some points which Shiro is speaking…well, neither is Keith… (I think the most interesting moment is “Shut the fuck up!” so if you’re curious, that’s Good Shiro speaking, not Dark Shiro. Nobody talks to his baby like that, not even "himself.")
> 
> \- This is probably the darkest fic I’ve ever written? Ngl that took a lot out of me, wow. I'd like to think Keith still finds Shiro in the astral plane and they figure out another way to save him. If that makes you feel any better.
> 
> \- As always: [I’m on tumblr](https://belovedsheith.tumblr.com), come say hi! <3


End file.
